


Waiting

by WanderingAlice



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 6000 Years of Pining (Good Omens), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Based on a Tumblr Post, M/M, Waiting, based on a tumblr gifset
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-08 16:30:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20838584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WanderingAlice/pseuds/WanderingAlice
Summary: He’ll wait forever, if he has to. He’s been waiting since Eden. SincebeforeEden. And at first… at first it was easy. Stolen glances in Mesopotamia. The brush of a hand in Golgotha. Oysters in Rome. They were enough to sate him, to cool the burn of longing under his skin. It was a fleeting thing, that fledgling emotion, coming and going with proximity. Hot and bright when he was with the angel, fading to a comfortable simmer as distance and time carried them apart. It didn’t matter, then, that the angel wasn’t ready to see it, wasn’t ready to reciprocate. He could wait. Waiting was easy. No longer.





	Waiting

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this thing on tumblr in like two hours while visiting my parents this weekend. It's inspired by [this lovely gifset on tumblr](https://wanderingalicewrites.tumblr.com/post/188035699202/wanderingsofalice-nannycrowley-crowley). (If you read the one on my tumblr, you can see the raw version vs the re-written one here. Which probably proves my point that I should always re-write my work at least once before posting. Especially when I screw up and accidentally post it to my main blog rather than my writing one.)

He’ll wait forever, if he has to. He’s been waiting since Eden. Since _before_ Eden. And at first… at first it was easy. Stolen glances in Mesopotamia. The brush of a hand in Golgotha. Oysters in Rome. They were enough to sate him, to cool the burn of longing under his skin. It was a fleeting thing, that fledgling emotion, coming and going with proximity. Hot and bright when he was with the angel, fading to a comfortable simmer as distance and time carried them apart. It didn’t matter, then, that the angel wasn’t ready to see it, wasn’t ready to reciprocate. He could wait. Waiting was easy. No longer.

It started, he thinks, with the Arrangement. When they really start to spend more time together. When, with a speed Crowley wasn’t _quite_ ready for, it wasn’t a few hours together here and there over the centuries. It was dinner every couple of months. And then walks in the park every few weeks. And then long nights in Aziraphale’s rooms, talking about anything and nothing.

The first time he truly notices it is at the Globe. Waiting for Aziraphale to give in, to agree to share Edinburgh. Waiting for him to meet his gaze, just once. To give him a glimpse of those clear bright eyes like sea-glass. When he does, it isn’t enough. The longing in him goes sharp and hot and _settles_, burning in his stomach.

It shifts again in the 1960’s, waiting in the Bentley as the angel, against everything he’s been taught - against even his own better judgment - provides Crowley with the one tool he needs to keep himself safe. The one thing that will keep them both safe, when this thing between them eventually comes to light. Words, half formed but insistent, echo inside him. _Can I say it? Is it time?_ He offers Aziraphale a ride, and the angel asks him to wait. To go slow. _It__’s not time yet_.

The end of the world makes it worse. The knowledge that he can wait forever, yes, if he must. But forever is eleven years long now, and the longing is a constant, steady burn. Like bourbon on the back of his throat. _Can I say it now? Can I tell him? Will he hear me?_ He swallows it down, and he waits for Aziraphale to make a choice. To choose to fight this, to give them both time. To choose him, against the cold comfort of Heaven.

Eleven years pass like a blink. Like an eternity. He’s still waiting, sitting on a park bench, waiting for Aziraphale to decide. He’ll follow his lead. He’ll always follow where the angel will lead. But Aziraphale has to decide their path. Kill the boy now, or wait. Stop this the easy way, the sure way, or hold on to the chance that there’s something good in the Antichrist. _Can I say it? Is it time? Is it now? We might not get another chance_. The words are whole inside him now. Three words. Eight letters. He swallows them down, and they burn like holy water in his chest. He has to wait. It is not time.

He waits again in the car on the way to the convent, when the words bubble up inside and threaten to spill out. _The world is going to end and I__’ll never have said it. We’re both going to die, and he’ll never know. Can I say it? Now?_ No. The angel isn’t ready to hear it. It’s too much to give him, on top of everything else. The love of a demon. Such a heavy thing, a thing that shouldn’t exist. Crowley isn’t naive enough to think he’ll bear it gladly. So he waits. And he tells himself it’s alright. He’ll wait until the end of the world and beyond. If they get a beyond.

He hears the words in the ringing of the phone, as he waits for Aziraphale to pick up. Like a heartbeat. Like breath. The end is close, he can feel it. The chaos bubbling up around the world. They don’t have much time left. Not much time, now, to say it. When Aziraphale picks up the phone, the words almost spill from his mouth. He swallows them back, but they catch in his throat, an ember burning against his esophagus. He can’t say it now. He has to wait.

He almost says it at the bandstand, spreading his arms wide, bearing his chest, his heart, and and asking for the angel to run away with him. It’s as close as he’s ever gotten to saying it. As close as he’s ever _going_ to get. _Now? Will he hear me now? Is it time?_ The words burn his tongue as he holds them back, waiting. Aziraphale must make a choice. The angel has to choose _him_. He can’t say it, can’t put it out there into the wide, cold universe, unless Aziraphale is ready to make that choice.

“It’s over,” the angel says. And the words burn sick and hot in his veins as Crowley turns and walks away. Is it waiting, really, if there’s never any end to it?

It almost spills from his lips as he waits for an answer, the second time he asks the angel to run away with him. It’s the last time he’ll have the chance. Hell will kill him soon, for what he’s done. They’ll destroy him utterly and completely, and not even this unvoiced feeling will remain. _Now? Is it the right time now? Will it ever be?_ He wants to say it now, before he dies. Doesn’t want to leave it unsaid. But Aziraphale… Aziraphale _forgives him_. And… the angel asked him to wait. Decades ago, yes, when he gave him the holy water. He wasn’t ready then. But he isn’t ready now, either. Not yet. So the words sit, burning, on his tongue. And still he waits.

At the airbase, he waits once more for Aziraphale to make a decision. Is this it? Is it over? Or do they fight? The words are at his lips, but he’s not going to say them here, surrounded by fear as they are. Aziraphale orders him to come up with a plan. So he does. He can’t not. Not when the alternative is never seeing the end of this waiting, the longing, this chorus of _want_ that sings in his blood.

The words press against his teeth at the bus stop, insistent, burning like the flames of Aziraphale’s sword. _Now? He__’ll hear me now, won’t he? If not now, when?_ And still, he waits. He waits for the angel to give him a sign. To turn him away once again. Tell him no. To choose Heaven once more, like he always does. Only, he doesn’t. He follows Crowley onto the bus. He sits _beside_ him, rather than in front. Presses their legs together, and holds his hand open on his knee - an offering for Crowley to take.

He takes it. But still, he holds back the words. He’s waited for so long now. Through so much. He’s not sure he’s capable of voicing them anymore. The letters get jumbled on his tongue, out of order, a garbled mess of sound.

He waits through the night, as they plan their trick. He waits as they switch bodies, wondering if Aziraphale can feel the way the words burn within him.

He waits through the park. Through dinner at the Ritz. The words stick in his throat, weighed down by fear. _Is he ready? Will he hear me? Is it now?_

They’re back at the bookshop, when Aziraphale puts a gentle hand on his. “I think, my dear,” he says. “I think it’s time to stop waiting.”

“I-” Crowley’s throat works, his lips move, but his voice will not respond. He’s waited so long now, trained himself to be silent, swallowed the words down so often. He doesn’t remember how to release them. How to act instead of waiting.

Aziraphale waits for him, this time. Patient, warm, a constant presence at his side. He takes Crowley’s hand and squeezes it, brings it to his lips and brushes a gentle kiss against his knuckles. “I’ll say it first, if you need me to,” he tells him. “But you’ve been so patient with me, for so very long now. You deserve to be the one to say it. I can wait.”

And he does. He waits for weeks, as the demon tries to unlearn millennia of holding back. Sitting beside him on the couch. Taking his hand on the bus. Leaning against his side at the theater. At night they hold each other while Crowley sleeps, and Aziraphale presses gentle kisses to his forehead, mouthing the words the demon can’t yet say. He doesn’t seem to tire of waiting. He just smiles, and touches his cheek, and promises he’ll wait forever, if he has to.

It’s an unremarkable morning, when it happens. When the waiting _finally_ ends. Crowley comes down from their room, sleep-mussed and yawning, to find the angel standing over the stove. He smiles a greeting as the demon slides into his place at the table, then turns back to the crepes in the pan. Crowley watches him, his gentle angel, standing there with the morning sun streaming in through the windows and lighting up his curls like wisps of clouds. He starts to hum, doing something with a spatula, and Crowley notes with fondness that there’s a smudge of flour on his cheek.

The words surge within him, like they always do these days. Eight letters slide into place. Three words, pressing against his lips, smoldering on his tongue. _Now. Now. Now. Now. Now._ It’s unbearable. It’s agony. The words build within him, a force against whatever it is that’s kept them in for six thousand years. The feeling builds and builds, wonderful, painful, bright and burning. Like fire. Like bourbon. Like holy water.

And then, they break free.

“I love you.”

Aziraphale’s spatula hits the ground. He turns, astonished, to stare at Crowley. But the demon is standing now, crossing the room to take him by the hands.

“I love you,” he says again. “_I love you_.”

Aziraphale gasps, eyes wide and sky-blue, a smile like sunlight growing on his face.

“I love you,” Crowley repeats, emotion spilling from his eyes, dripping wetly down his cheeks. “I love you.”

“Oh, my darling one,” the angel whispers, reaching out and pulling him close. “My very dearest love.” He brings a hand up to cradle Crowley’s cheek, then slides his fingers back until they’re tangled in the long strands of red hair. His other catches Crowley around the waist, tugging him closer still.

And Crowley waits once more, there on the edge of everything, the razor-thin line between what was and what shall be. Nothing between them now but a breath of air. He doesn’t have to wait long.

“My dear Crowley,” Aziraphale says, leaning in until their lips brush. “And I, I love you, too.”

He doesn’t have to wait anymore.


End file.
